


Queen’s Gambit

by Anima Nightmate (faithhope)



Series: All For One and, well, you know the rest... [3]
Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Art Holds Up A Mirror To Life, Biblical References, Biblical Reinterpretation, Chess, Chess Metaphors, Chest Binding, Clothed Sex, Confessions, Costumes, Crossdressing, Cunnilingus, Disguise, Dreams vs. Reality, Episode Related, Escape, Etiquette, Explicit Sexual Content, Extended Metaphors, Extended Scene, F/F, F/M, Fantasizing, Female Friendship, Female Solo, Feminist Themes, Finger Sucking, Flashbacks, Forfeits, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Frottage, Game Theory, Herbalism, Honey, Intrigue, Kissing, Lilith - Freeform, Masturbation, Medieval Medicine, Metaphors, Minor Original Character(s), Mythology - Freeform, Oral Sex, Orgasm, Plant lore, Politics, Porn With Plot, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Scissoring, Secrets, Sewing, Sexual Fantasy, Sexual Tension, Slow Burn, Sparring, Strip Chess, Tension, Theatre, Verbal Sparring, seriously slow burn, spoilers to s2e3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-05
Updated: 2018-03-10
Packaged: 2019-03-27 14:41:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 18,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13883013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/faithhope/pseuds/Anima%20Nightmate
Summary: The new Queen’s Confidante, Constance Bonacieux, is intelligent, capable, loyal, witty, and adventurous, and scrambling to learn quickly in a whole new world of intrigue and court games. Will her love for the Queen (and the sadly-relinquished d’Artagnan) see her through, or will she have to change herself fundamentally to learn and adapt to these new rules?In the meantime, another’s growing passion for Constance herself may shake her world to its foundations.





	1. Isolani

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Appetite is sated, with some imagination.

The morning summons are about to ring out, but that’s all right, because she’s on time. Early, even. She turns a critical look at the full-length mirror (such luxury) and frowns lightly. Silly bloody collar. Well, can’t be helped.

Tapping at it irritably, she steps away and starts to head down the corridor, the movement of others in a similar direction hinting at the time, their common purpose. Mind on the morning ahead, she tells herself. Focus.

The clip, clip, clip, clip of her heels on the marble floor brings her a small frisson of pleasure. Such a distinct sound. So.

Proper.

Around her similar sounds echo as they all move across the smooth squares, and she amuses herself briefly with the mechanism of walking; all souls - noble and otherwise - employing the same equipment to.

To

Damn.

She has forgotten.

No, focus.

No

She

Damnit, you’re on time for once, come on.

Just.

The hunger is rising.

Really, she scolds herself, anyone would think you’re a

Desperate woman.

No!

Damn!

Fatally, instead of focusing on how to ignore this, on how she can fit it in later, after seeing to the morning’s business, she thinks about how swiftly she can assuage her hunger. And that leads to the set of little promises.

Five minutes

That’s all it’ll take

Five. All right, maybe ten. But

I’ve got plenty of time.

Plenty.

And now she’s ravenous.

Cheeks flushing, she takes a sharp right out of the salmon flow of courtiers and, heels now sounding clipclipclipclip, fishing a key out of her skirts, she lets herself into a large cupboard.

It’s more of a small room, really. It’s only in a palace would this be called a cupboard. She locks the door after her, heads deeper in, takes a turn right and breathes in the scents of the enclosed space, head already swimming.

You can do this, she says. Swiftly and without a fuss, and be on time - nearly, probably - for

Oh, sod it.

Constance Bonacieux pockets the key to the cupboard, leans into a fragrant stack, and lets her hands rove, stoking her appetite.

She’d received the key on her first day in the post of Queen’s confidante, and, when asked why, the fish-faced old harrid… the experienced older courtier Madame de Beauvilliers had  _ kindly _ explained that among her new duties was that of ensuring that Queen’s nightly needs were supplied as required.

Now she blesses Mme de B for unwittingly providing her with this bolt-hole. Literally! Now she really is starting to feel hysterical. Come on, Constance. Take things in hand.

Stifling a giggle, she carefully kilts her skirts so she can safely put her foot up just there and reach.

Ah.

Leaning back onto a bolt of fresh linen, one hand at her breast, the other brushing up her inner thigh, Constance lets her eyes close, her mind begin to wander to those images that will help things along a little quicker.

It’s the brush of her thighs under her skirts on warm days when she has decided to forgo underwear. It’s the way her breasts feel against the confines of the corset as she breathes heavily. It’s the tight arse on the newest recruit to the guards under his leather trousers. It’s. Oh. Yes, him.

D’Artagnan, his eyes darkening as he finally tells her that he loves her. The sweep of his hand clearing away the everyday pieces of her life. It’s the press of his, oh, his body. The glorious weight of him. His. His hands, broad, well-shaped, strong, sensitive, so new to her, so familiar. The promise of that soft mouth fulfilled on hers. The way.

Her left hand creeps to her mouth, and she nibbles on the side of her index finger.

He is warm and hard against her, the swordsman’s body, the rider’s body, his long hair framing his face as he dips forward, plants a kiss on her.

On her

Oh.

“Oh, God, yes,” she moans, and her frantic strokes below redouble at the soft sound of her own voice.

It’s his breath on her belly as he creeps lower, tongue dallying in excruciating patterns on her skin.

Her fingers no longer dabble at her nub; she has pressed the middle two deep inside herself, wrist bent, hips straining to her desperate rhythm. She curves her digits just the right amount, the angle she has learned over a dozen dizzying encounters with herself, and  _ beckons _ swiftly as she plunges. And.

And

Oh.

“Oh, here it comes,” the sensations sharpen, her body tightens, she stuffs her thumb down to its soft root inside her mouth and even the action of her own tongue on that pad of flesh is enough to send her over the edge, shouting soft, dampened obscenities, grabbing the nearest pillow case and ramming it into her mouth, biting, ah, Mary, Mother of God, oh God, she… Ah…

Ah!

Her breathing subsides, and she is warm - too warm, really - through and through, the sharp, insistent glow banked for a little. With an effort, she withdraws her right hand, smoothes down her skirt with her left - she is learning fast - and, without even thinking, puts her fingers to her mouth to clean them.

Her knees buckle at the taste of herself - sharpsweet, fragrant as, as figs with cheese, her mind giggles and gibbers.

“Hush, Constance,” she tells herself, giggles again, pushes her tongue between her fingers to ensure she’s removed every possible drop, stuffs the bitten pillowcase deep under a pile where hopefully it’ll flatten itself out, don’t think about that now, just go.

Before the door she shakes herself down, checks the position of the ridiculous collar - seems all right - and flicks a couple of errant hairs back off her still-heated cheeks.

She takes a swift, salutary breath - in, out - unlocks the door and heads out, back to duty.


	2. Sortie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A brief discourse on the properties of plants.

Clip, clip, clip, clip clip, clipclipclip.

Ooooh, I’m going to be late!

“-ame -onaci-!” She shook her head and carried on, deciding no, she’d been mistaken, and the sound was lost behind her in the echo of her own footsteps. “ _ Constance! _ ”

Oops! She skidded to a turning halt in a rather unladylike fashion. A familiar, black-clad figure hurried towards her, face full of the usual neutral courtesy he displayed at court. “Madame, a moment?”

“Yes, monsieur?” She found herself starting to curtsy; Athos’s noble air, no matter how suppressed by rusty, practical leathers and unfashionable beard, often threw her into a roulette of manners. She frowned her foolishness into submission and looked up at him with what felt like a somewhat impatient smile as he approached. Did she look as flushed as she felt? No matter.

“I have a message for your mistress,” he said.

“Oh?” The roulette stopped on: courier.

“Yes, and it needs to be handed directly to her or - in this case - her closest confidante.”

Still not quite used to that! “Thank you!” She took the small package from him, gave a small bob of a curtsy with a nod of her head. She couldn’t help noticing that life - or maybe just he himself - was treating him better than usual. He seemed tired, but there was a small sparkle in those blue-grey, Northern eyes which actually met hers for once, a kind of banked glow. He looked… cleaner than the Musketeers often did. More content. Maybe the curse of Milady was leaving him after all.

He smiled. Nicely. She smiled back, nodded again, turned to leave. “Ah, madame,” he said. “I have another message.”

“You do?”

He dropped his voice, leaned forward a little; she found herself instinctively mirroring him. “A verbal one this time, purportedly from Ninon de Larroque.”

She felt the blood leave her face, her hands clench a little, but schooled her face. “Go on,” she said, with another brisk, little nod.

“It is simply this: ‘Remain true to yourself.’”

“Oh.” Was that it?

“There is nothing further, madame.”

“Well,” she said, leaning back again. “Well, thank you, monsieur, er. Thank you, Athos.” Idiot.

“It was my pleasure,” he assured her gravely, with a slow, deep courtesy of his own.

He turned and she swivelled back to her original direction. After four steps she hissed a small curse to herself, put the package in her pocket, picked up her skirts and clipped into something perilously close to a run.

Well, at least she had a good excuse this time.

She slid to a halt just before the doors, pushed them open a crack and crept through them under the amused green eye of the Breton guard. Once in, she made a series of crabwise scuttles to the middle of the small crowd - two steps sideways for every one forward. The King was present today, and clearly already impatient with business matters.

“It is a fine day,” he declared. “I will ride abroad this afternoon. See that the usual Musketeers are informed.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“If I may just…”

“And I think a spot of hunting. Or at least shooting, haha.” Everyone laughed dutifully. “See to it.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“There is the question of the Dauphin’s christening,” said the more stubborn courtier, pushing a little more volume.

“The day after tomorrow,” said the King. “What of it?”

The Queen caught Constance’s eye and rolled her eyes subtly above a very small smile. Constance smirked in response, then reached up to rub a little under her nose as if suppressing a sneeze. The Queen’s eyes slid away.

The courtier turned a small sigh into a clearing of the throat. “I… We were wondering, Your Majesty, about the arrangements for…”

“Oh, cloth-of-gold, I think,” waved the King airly.

“Your Majesty?”

“And the usual voluntary. The Lady Chapel, I think.”

“Your Majesty.”

“And Bishop Fianchetto.”

“Er, Your Majesty does not wish the Arch…”

“No, the Bishop will send a useful message.”

“He’s not…”

“Not French? No, but that’s rather the point, isn’t it?” He looked out to the crowd and laughed lightly. They followed suit.

He frowned down at the courtier. “He’s a good bishop, isn’t he?”

“I  _ think _ ,” said the Comte de Rochefort, easing forward, “that what the _Vi_ comte de Rivière,” he nodded at the courtier, who bowed slightly, muscles working in his jaw, “was  _ trying _ to say,” Constance noticed the slight emphasis, as with the denotation of his lower rank, clocked that snake sidle of his blonde head, “is that the people  _ rather _ expect a spectacle, Your Majesty,” the gleaming head inclined to the dais.

“Cloth of gold,” said the King. “Voluntaries. Largesse scattered to the commonality afterwards. Etcetera. He is  _ my _ son,” he added reproachfully, the dark eyes wide.

Constance was sure she saw it this time - the slight clench of the Queen’s left hand on the arm of her chair. She thought back to all the times she’d seen this, how many more she must have missed.

Oh dear.

“Your Majesty,” de Rivière swept low.

“But you can see to the placement of the nobles, etc., if that would please you.”

“Your Majesty, I…”

“Well, you do seem keen, and I like to reward keenness.” His gaze swept around, over the low-bowing Vicomte, seeming to miss the predatory gleam in Rochefort’s eye. Constance rather thought that the Comte would insist on a good place to stand at the ceremony. “Now, if there’s nothing else?”

Everyone bowed or curtsied in unison, Constance half a beat behind them.  _ How do they always do that?! _ She wondered, furiously, feeling her cheeks heat.

The answer murmured: they’ve been training for this since they could walk.

Damn.

_ Well _ , she told herself firmly,  _ I’m a quick learner. Everyone always says so. _ She remembered Ninon de Larroque’s message, found that she’d clenched her fists in their otherwise demure clasp in front of her.

The bodies around her started, and she rose too, heard the King sweep, clop, clip, clop from the room. She looked up and into the steely eyes of Madame de Beauvilliers, who opened her formidable, if narrow, jaw with a dramatic in-breath, no doubt to remonstrate with the dilatory Madame Bonacieux for her tardiness.

Constance braced. Last week it had been “Punctuality is the politeness of princes,” a little phrase she clearly hoped would go down in court posterity, “so it behoves us to be no less courteous.” Constance had refrained from telling her that being on time was a great boon to business to boot, made easier by not wearing such ridiculous bloody clothes, but on the third repetition it was a close-run thing.

“Constance,” came warm, honeyed tones from behind the formidable woman, who swept aside into a graceful crouch to reveal the Queen, holding her hands out. “There you are.” She smiled down at the still-lowered noblewoman, said: “I do hope you don’t mind - I need Constance,” and swept her away towards the smaller reception room beyond the courtroom, tailed by the usual discrete ladies who positioned themselves by the doors.

“Dearest Constance,” smiled the Queen, in the relative quiet. “Shall we take a walk?”

“As Your Majesty wishes,” she said, deadpan, and they both grinned.

She had been amazed how quickly her respect and natural love for the Queen had started to blossom into something like real friendship, prompted, in part, by the pity she had quickly come to feel for, and ruthlessly hide from, her ruler. Her aunt had always told her: show someone trust, and they’ll return it. Constance wasn’t convinced that it was a universal truth, but this philosophy had bloomed some interesting rewards.

_ Like a man with strong, nimble hands, a soft mouth, eyes you could drown in. _

Shut up.

_ Broad shoulders, tight… _

Shut it!

The Governess, Marguerite… something… Constance ground her teeth and wished she was better with names, twittered after them with the Dauphin. There, she thought, was a woman who could do with a key to the linen cupboard, and she smiled broadly at the silk-wrapped pair, much to the Governess’s confusion, as they stepped into the open air.

As they walked, churning a soft crunch of gravel, long skirts a susurrus, the Queen spoke of flowers and herbs, pointing out her favourites to Constance. She talked of the importance of juxtaposition, of finding the right soils, sunlight, temperature, water, to nurture fragile blooms. She asked Constance with seemingly genuine interest about how plants were grown where she was from.

Constance confessed that she’d never been much adept at making things grow, having whatever the opposite of a green thumb would be, but her mother had grown flowers in their kitchen garden, and her aunt had made great use of old barrels and pots to grow herbs for food and health in a small space. She paused there, as her aunt’s activities hadn’t always been popular.

The Queen didn’t seem to notice. “You’re not from Paris, originally, are you, Constance?”

“No, Your Majesty.” She made a grimacing smile. “I don’t think I’ll ever master the right accent for your court.”

“I don’t care about that.” The Queen stopped, turned, took Constance’s hands. “But I do care to know more about you.” She gave her hands a little squeeze, then turned towards the Governess. “Marguerite, how does the Dauphin fare?”

The woman crunched forward hurriedly. “Well, Your Majesty, see?”

“I think he may need a nap before long, don’t you?”

Constance never ceased to be impressed how a question could also be an order, and understood as such.

Marguerite bobbed her assent and swayed away back towards the Palace.

“How are you finding your apartments?” asked the Queen as she resumed her pace.

“Oh! They’re lovely, Your Majesty, very, er, spacious.” Nearly the size of poor Bonacieux’s whole ground floor! “And so light and airy.”

“I’m glad you like them,” and she sounded glad. She leaned a little closer. “I wonder… if you have any messages for me.”

Ah. “Yes. A package, in fact.”

“Who delivered it?” The Queen’s voice sharpened - not unpleasant, just… less padded, she supposed.

“Athos, of the King’s Musketeers.”

“Ah, and this is why you were late?”

Constance winced before she could stop herself. “My… Your Majesty, I…”

The Queen laughed, a merry, bright-eyed peal. “I rather think I rescued you from Madame de Beauvilliers’s remonstrance!”

Constance smiled back, relief and humour mingled: “I rather think you did!”

The Queen sobered, slowed. “And the package?”

“Ah, here.” She drew it out of her pocket and passed it into the Queen’s palm, the soft fingers closing for a moment on her own as she took its slight weight and stowed it, without looking at it, in her own pocket, not once breaking her pace.

She took a left turn down into the herb garden. The path was too narrow for them to walk abreast, so the Queen rustled ahead between the bee-heavy stalks, sending up a swoon of scent in her wake. She crouched, beckoned Constance, who dutifully crouched beside her.

“See? I brought these from Spain. Sage and lavender.” She pointed. Constance forbore from pointing out that she could recognise any number of herbs - fresh and dried - and that she never struggled to put them in pans or pillowcases, only to make them thrive beforehand. The Queen cupped the latter, brought a bee-free spray towards her face. Constance couldn’t help but smile at the obvious pleasure the sun-drenched scent brought her. “They need nurturing until they’ve established themselves, and then they become almost impossible to displace. No matter how strong the seed, the growing plant still needs special care.”

Constance had a strong feeling that more than the two meanings she could immediately wring from this were being offered. She nodded and murmured agreement.

The Queen stood and beckoned her further down the path, back towards the Palace. As the path broadened, she tucked alongside Constance and took her arm, talked of how the poppies were unfurling, the bay tree thriving, dark, glossy and aloof, reminding Constance somehow of Athos, sentinel among the bright colours.

Soon after lunch, the King rode out with several of his Musketeers, Constance resolutely did not watch them go.


	3. Exposed King

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which games are discussed.

“Constance, do you know how to play chess?”

“M… Your Majesty?”

Constance had been drifting somewhat, after dinner. There had been some interesting rumours among the servants about the King asking a man of the guard to take his clothes off, and her mind was busy turning over what that might be in aid of. She looked down at her embroidery, which she still found tedious - lace-making, yes; dress-making, yes; embroidery, bleugh - round at the other ladies, gossipping or nodding over their own hoops, and finally back to the Queen, who smiled, patiently.

“Do you know how to play chess, Constance?”

“Er, no, your majesty.” She had a mad desire to tell her that she could play horseshoes and hopscotch, but sat heavily on that. “It looks similar to draughts, but with different pieces.”

The other ladies twittered and giggled at this. Constance had been learning how to ignore them. The Queen smiled, indulgently, but Constance, closer than the others, could see a sharpness to it.

“I desire that you should learn,” she said, formally, at a louder volume. “I require that my chief attendant should be versed in all manner of means to entertain me.”

“Gabrielle plays the virginal,” piped up one of a pair of maidens near the window.

“Thank you,” said the Queen, sweetly, “but unfortunately I find the virginal a tedious instrument, so that skill will not be required.”

The four widows by the fire croaked quietly to each other, cocked beady rook eyes at this.

“Who else here plays chess?” A pause. “Well.”

The tall girl with the ears… Madeleine… raised her hand slowly. Everyone gazed at her until she put her hand down again.

The Queen sighed. “I will teach you myself, it would appear.” When the others returned their interest to their laps, the Queen dropped Constance a tiny wink. “Please go and ask Sofia to show you where I keep my set.”

“Now, Your Majesty?”

“Now,” she said, and again the sharpness in her tone was belied by the gleam in her eye.

Outside in the corridor the candles were being lit. Constance followed the statuesque Sofia as she glided to the Queen’s bedchamber and showed Constance the chest where the set was kept. Sofia was a tall, dark, dignified person, who tended to speak as little as possible. Constance had heard that she had a beautiful singing voice, but could only be induced to unveil it under certain circumstances. For this instance, Sofia pointed a dark, narrow hand at the chest with a flick of her eyebrows. Constance crouched, opened it and, at further eyebrow-flicking, peeled back two layers of blankets to reveal a dark, wooden, heavily-carved box which rattled gently as she lifted it out.

Unable to resist, she carefully unhooked the metal clasp with her fingernail and slowly lifted the lid. The scent of dark wood, some kind of nut oil, maybe almonds, and something sweeter wafted towards her. She turned her back to the window, still sunset-lit, and lifted it wider. Cradling the box in her left arm, she picked out a piece at random and turned it in the reddish light. It flared at its base and fluted into an unmistakable coronet at the top.

“That is the Queen,” came what had to be Sofia’s voice. It was rich and mellow, carrying more of the Spanish accent than her mistress’s. Constance wanted to hear it again, and so said: “Do you play?”

“Not anymore.” A pause. “Not for a long time.” Another pause. “Close it up now, girl.”

Constance decided that she’d rather be called “girl” by this woman than “Madame… Bonacieux” by Madame de Beauvilliers or any of the others. She nodded, replaced the piece, closed and clasped the box and carried it with some reverence to the Queen’s sitting room, where she found a table had been cleared already.

The others hovered, clearly torn between being bored and seeing the new girl schooled. Constance scolded herself - they’re not that bad. The rooks shuffled and the virginals whispered. I miss having friends, she thought, suddenly and deeply miserable. Women who have my back no matter what. I took that so much for granted before I married, and now look at me.

“Lay the board here, Constance.” And Constance discovers that the box itself, once emptied, fully opened, and laid flat upside down (or inside down, she thinks), has a layer to be unclipped and lifted out to reveal the squares of the board. It is intricate and efficient in a way she wouldn’t have predicted. She can’t help but think that the outside of the box could have just been the squares, but maybe the maker (or the patron) wanted the sober, dark, textured wood as the day-to-day display. Or wanted to protect the squares. This is a thing made to last and made to move.

The Queen’s pale hands turn the board by one side, so that the first row of squares starts with a black one, and lift the pieces and place them - light on Constance’s side, dark on her own. A layer of the identical pieces faces the other, backed by the more individualistic pieces.

The Queen points to each, names them. Constance echoes their names quietly. She then demonstrates the way they move - pawns the most limited; towers strong and simple (“They guard, you see?”); fools gliding as a slanted surprise (“In England, they call them ‘bishops’!”); the knights cantering along peculiar paths (“their power and limitation is their unpredictability”); and finally the royal pair - both of them able to move in any direction, but the King, the one who is to be protected, can only move one square at a time, the Queen as far as she likes.

“So the Queen is the most powerful,” says Constance. A small flutter among the others.

“Yet without the King,” the other reminds her, gently, “all is lost.”

“So the pawns advance like…” she chews her lip for the word, “foot soldiers. Slowly, only forward.”

“Yes.”

“So they’re only cannon fodder.”

“Not… exactly.”

“They’re there to get in the way of the more powerful pieces.” She points. “You can set up blockades, make it difficult for the others. I suppose,” she says, slowly, “that’s where the knights become more useful.”

She looks up to see the Queen smiling at her. “I was right,” she says, gently exultant.

Constance smiles back. “And the fools can slip between while the towers keep things honest at the sides.”

“Yes.” The Queen’s voice is meditative.

“And the Queen,” she goes on, “the Queen can go anywhere, but has to be careful not to give in to the temptation to roam too far.”

She feels the temperature drop as she says this.

Oh, Constance.

Damn, damn.

“In the old days,” says the Queen, still meditative, distant, “they were called viziers.”

“‘Viziers’?”

“Arabian… First Ministers, I suppose you’d say.”

She reaches and touches the Queen’s tall black piece with a forefinger. “Cardinal Richelieu?”

The Queen laughs, merry again, rocking back and clapping her hands. The rest of the women laugh, a chorus of pigeons, heads bobbing, invaded by a note of uncertainty, but Constance just grins and the Queen grins back.

She claps her hands again, twice, sharply. “The rest of you can go.” The pigeons deflate. She shoos them. “I will play a first game with Constance now.” She nods to Sofia, who ushers the women out with flat, narrow hands, silent and grave.

“You start,” says the Queen, “as white.”

It is a slaughter. A very gentle, polite slaughter. The Queen even tries to hint that Constance may not want to make certain moves, but Constance has already decided that, whatever she does, she will do, follow through, learn the consequences.

_ I didn’t learn hopscotch by winning first time _ , she thinks,  _ and the best soup I ever made was the one after the one I burned. _

When they’ve finished, her head is pounding, and the Queen calls for honeyed wine. She then speaks rapidly to Sofia in Spanish, during which the older servant shakes her head repeatedly, then wags her head side-to-side and concludes in a flurry of her own.

“My apologies,” says the Queen, in flawless French. “It’s quicker that way. I have a book I’d like you to read, but I only have it in Spanish. Sofia will try to find a translation. There’s bound to be one.” She smiles at Constance. “Drink your wine, my dear, and go to bed. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Do you really want me to learn this game so much?”

“I love it,” says the Queen, simply. “And I want to share it with you.” She smiles, eyes distance. “Had I a daughter,” and pain crosses her face. She recovers. “Had I a daughter, I would call her Caïssa.” She laughed. “There’s even a goddess of chess, you see!”

“Caïssa?” Constance’s eyebrows rise in the middle, against her better judgement.

“Well,” confesses the Queen, “maybe as a middle name.”

They smile, and she is finally ushered out.

On the way back to her apartment, Constance hears rumours that the King is out carousing and has still not returned. “Well,” she thinks, hazily, “he has towers, fools, and knights around him; I’m sure he’ll be fine.”


	4. Flight Square

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the many uses of books. And the ubiquity of leeches.

Constance had decided something. It was basically this: Ruy López de Segura could kiss her bum.

“Of course,” she muttered crossly to herself, “I’d have to dig him up for that to happen, but I bet even his bones would be less dry than his bloody book, and a lot less pompous.”

Sofia had found a copy in French for her. The premise was this: some other obsessive had written a book about chess, and Father López had read it and thought: I can do better. In fact, he’d spent a considerable amount of the back half of the book ripping into the other fellow, and frankly Constance was damned if she was going get anyone to dig out the much-maligned earlier tome with the imaginative title of what she’d tentatively translated as: “This book will tell you how to play chess and leave”. Which couldn’t be right but sod it. If it was worse than “Book of the liberal invention and art of the game of chess” then she was having none of it, even if it helped her understand the figures in this one better.

She wondered briefly how treasonous burning a book given to you by the Queen would be, or even accidentally dropping it into a latrine. Hmm…

The nightly games had been progressing. She hadn’t won one yet, but, well, at least she was occupying the Queen, and that was the main thing.

Being up this early was… a nuisance, but there was one thing at least to be said for being woken by bloody explosions - you stayed awake, and you didn’t… feel hungry.

Today was not a day with anything formal planned, so she’d dressed accordingly. Well, “not formal” here was still a step more fancy than what she would have worn to church back… in her former life.

_You’re still married._

Shut up.

She paced the Queen’s sitting room, book in her pocket, wondering if she had time to try to force-feed some more dusty words into her dry, knotted brain.

She drummed her fingers on her arm, wondering where the Governess could have got to. Their duties were fairly predictable, but there was rarely a great deal of time to waste, and the Queen, roused as early as everyone else by the dawn-time fun and games, had already made her toilette.

Finally, some movement stirred in the cradle room. She walked over to see the Governess, drawn, with dark patches under her eyes and hair a little less than perfect. Again. She wished she did not know that Marguerite de Lansac had been dallying with monotonous frequency with Aramis of the King’s Musketeers. _I mean_ , she thought, _he’s very pretty to look at, and - according to that pastry cook - remarkably… talented, but it’s obvious he’s not after a permanent mistress. It’s rare he stays with any particular woman long enough to taste their… pastries… more than thrice._

Shaking her head to clear it of a set of uncomfortably vivid images, she advanced on the Governess.

“You’re late, Marguerite. You know the Queen likes her son to be ready when she wakes.” _Well, now you sound like Madame de Beauvilliers. Aren’t_ you _progressing!_

The woman looked up at her, not with sated guilt, but with genuine concern. “The Dauphin was restless in the night. I think he might be ill.”

Constance could feel the blood drain from her face. The baby chucked and gurgled on a high, hiccoughing whine as she put her suddenly cold hands to his flushed face and chest. “He’s burning up. He needs a doctor.” Almost reluctantly, she left the room. The Queen would need to know.

*  *  *

 _Well_ , she says to herself, teeth gritted. _Well done. You said: “But won’t he throw it up? He’s still on the breast.” To the_ King.

Summarily dismissed from Queen’s apartments as someone who was superfluous to current requirements, she’d all-but run to her chambers. Unable to settle to anything, especially bloody López, she decides to go for a walk, hoping that she’d stop hectoring herself soon.

Distraction in the form of angry petitioners denied an audience with the King clatter downstairs, all sheafs and gesticulations, gripped hats, dull brown doublets and… hello! A flash of something like gold and cream…

No.

No, it can’t be.

She leans over the balustrade.

_Nothing there. You’re imagining things. The, the distress of the Dauphin’s illness, the King’s contempt, the lack of sleep, the lack of… well, anyway, you’re seeing things._

That evil cow couldn’t be in Paris, let alone the King’s Palace.

Jaw set, she heads back to the Queen’s apartments. She knows her place. The King could bluster all he wanted, but she’s not leaving either the Queen’s wing or the Dauphin’s side, not for all the Professors of the Sorbonnes in the world

*  *  *

It looks very like no-one wants to be on hand for leeches - not the King, not the Queen, not even Rochefort. Maybe it’s too close a family resemblance for him.

 _Bad Constance_.

Right. Well. Leeches it is, then. Hold his wee hand so that

Oh, God.

No.

No, no, no.

No, this is disgusting.

This is _ridiculous_.

Her aunt had never bled anyone. Well, all right, some of them bled afterwards, but that was

That wasn’t the cure, that was

Damnit, Constance, keep your eye on the job.

He’s a professor.

_He’s a trendy moron._

Oooh, that’s mean.

_It’s bloody true, and you bloody know it is._

“Well, that’s done. We’ll let him rest now.”

Marguerite looks at her, begging with her eyes, and she escorts the doctor to the door, saying: “You’ve been given chambers nearby, yes? We’ll call on you if we need you.”

“I really am doing all I can, you know.”

“We know. The King, well, he likes to shout, but he really is very impressed with you.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really; once you’ve been around him long enough, you get to read the signs.”

“So…” Lemay gulps a little, coughs. “So he won’t…” whispers “ _behead me_?”

She wrinkles her nose, tries out some options:

Almost certainly not. _That’s not exactly comforting._

He hasn’t had anyone beheaded in _ages_ . Mind, no-one’s ever killed his son, so I can’t guarantee that… _Hmm, not really_.

“It’s highly unlikely,” she says aloud. “Besides, the leeches are _bound_ to work, aren’t they?” She nods, big-eyed, remembering how well that used to work on Monsieur Bonacieux when persuading him that something was his idea.

“Yes,” he whispers, “of course. Very… very efficacious remedy.” Some of his colour returns. “You’ll call me.”

“Of course,” she says, firmly, and all-but pushes him out of the door.

Turning, she sees Marguerite, looking wan, and about as useful as a damp hanky.

“I’ll read to him for a bit, see if I can get him settled.” The woman’s face is a picture of relief and gratitude. She staggers off to refresh herself.

Besides, Constance now knows _exactly_ what she’s going to do.

Standing over the cradle, she begins: “‘First chapter. In which is outlined the game of games, the game of sciences, the mathematical game. Being the game of games, the game of sciences, the mathematical game, it is comprised of many aspects.’ Who translated this, eh? ‘Firstly, because it is based on two liberal arts, namely Geometry, and Arithmetic:’ That’s a liberal art, is it? Could have fooled me. Anyway, Louis, “because it is known to be configured on one side of a square and flat surface, which, being a square of the number eight, which is a full number…”

After a few pages she looks down and murmurs “Well, now we know something this horrible book is good for.” The heir to the throne sleeps for now, and this fool plans to take a direction no-one had accounted for.

*  *  *

The familiar smell of the laundry, the warmth, the lack of sleep, they all conspired against her. Rocking from Rochefort’s blow, she finds that she sees a lot of things very clearly. The first of which was: her earlier comparison had been an insult to the leeches.

Hauled up the stairs like a common criminal, she is still thinking, trying to see at least the next two moves. The Dauphin is breathing better for a start. That has to count for something. And if all else fails, they won’t execute her there - they have to move her, and that means opportunities to escape. Also: she could try… her stomach lurches… some kind of variation on Helpless Woman.

Who was going to fall for that? They might as well…

That

Wait.

That was _definitely_.

_That was Milady de Winter!_

Bold as brass and twice as shiny, cat eyes aglow and _delighted_ to see Constance being treated so roughly. No doubt she knows _exactly_ what had happened. Somehow.

Inside the Queen’s apartments, her mistress’s words rock her worse than Rochefort’s blow: “What _possessed_ you, Constance? Do you _hate me so much?_ ”

“I was trying to save his _life!_ ”

It was for you, it was all for you. It was the right thing to do, and I’d do it again a hundred times over.

Finally, faith restored to those wide, blue eyes, she knows that it was all worth it.


	5. Lucena

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A twining of figures, a doubling of fugues.

The bruising face doesn’t hurt as much as the knowledge that she’s left it too late.

“My friends will be looking for me.”

I do have friends, I do.

“Your friends are tearing themselves apart. Athos is dead, murdered by your beloved d’Artagnan.”

The man paces and curses, but she only has eyes for the woman, cool and pert, yet possessed of enough passion to punch her in the face.

She summons up all she can muster: “I knew you were evil. From the first moment I saw you, I knew.” God, that sounds feeble. Get up.

“You have such spirit,” she purrs. Dangerous threads of sensation course through her. Get. Up. “I understand what d’Artagnan sees in you.” D’Artagnan. How. “What a shame it must end like this.”

No! No! No, I won’t look!

Constance bolts upright, heaving herself from the nightmare. It’s. It’s just a sticky tarpit of memory, consuming and painful, but that’s all.

That’s all.

It doesn’t mean anything.

Three, no, five, well, several times now since that woman has infected the court with her presence, Constance has had the most vivid dreams, a falling into the memories - sight, sound, touch.

She has woken more than once with the feel of that woman’s fingers on her. “One more step and she dies.”

Mind you, that one’s all right - an elbow to the chest, and escaping into d’Artagnan’s arms. “I didn’t mean it!”

I didn’t.

Why didn’t Athos kill her?

She breathes in deep, summons d’Artagnan’s arms around her. But not on the street, dusty with battle, ragged with escape. No. Clean, rested, in a bed. This bed? Any bed. The sun comes through the window beyond him and he murmurs her name, brown eyes side-lit to the most vivid colour.

She surges up to kiss him, full on the lips, arches against him. He takes her weight in one broad hand between her shoulderblades, lays her back down on the bed.

She lays back down on the bed. Her breathing starts to speed up.

“Constance,” he murmurs down her body, laying kisses in sacred profusion from her neck to her breast. He takes her nipple between his lips, applies a small amount of pressure, eyes dipping up to hers to catch her expression.

Her fingers nip and twist, just a little. She slicks her fingers with her tongue and tries again. Oh. Oh, she needs to remember _that._

His tongue flicks across the stiffening flesh, and she feels sensation coursing down her body in swift-arcing tendrils. But he won’t stop there; he kisses the soft swell of the underside of her breast and, left hand remaining, fingers plucking on the other nipple, he continues to kiss his way down her belly, laying trails of hot wetness with his tongue, his eyes constantly lifting to hers now, tongue a brush writing her desire, down and down.

Constance’s fingers are playing at one breast and curving across her skin, heading down to where heat and moisture are rising, where her hips have begun an involuntary rhythm of lifting against

his weight, delicious, freely given, disappearing further down her body. Tongue dipping now, oh God, green eyes lifting, a smile curving across her.

“You’re very pretty.”

“So are you.”

What?

For the second time that night, Constance Bonacieux rouses herself from bed with her heart pounding. This time she stays up, determinedly reading by moonlight. When that fades, she lights a candle and plays chess against herself until the dawn creeps in, whereupon she gets dressed with a jaw set like steel, and prepares to meet the day head-on.

*  *  *

“It’s very clever,” says the King. “What is it?”

Ahead of them, thin strips of blue-green cloth with white splashes undulate in a mix of sunset and candlelight between the hands of various lithe people of… Constance squints, she’s going to say: various sexes… dressed in what looks like not much more than silk and paint.

She squints again. Or satin. Could be satin.

Over and under each other they go, crossing and recrossing. Every so often, a lithe body bursts from between the fabric and dives beneath it again. So far so… well, she thinks, she’s sure it’s very modern.

The music lilts, a washing pattern of sigh and rumble, flute and tambor and… strings and things. The waves subside and a golden figure walks across  the middle, arms raised triumphantly.

The figures whirl, start to divest themselves of another set of layers. Now greens and browns start to dominate the stage, and more players come in. Some raise ribboned poles to either side. Some pile mounds of cloth in strategic places. Others strut and crawl and peck, and look to be climbing things that aren’t there, and she thinks that one is pretending to fly. She rubs a finger under her nose and tries to think of serious things, things that will prevent her from giggling. She recalls last night’s chess game, the first time she’s come close to pushing the Queen to a draw, simply by temporising to bring the game to fifty moves and an automatic stop. A bit like fiddling about with committees for things until the King gets bored with an expensive new notion, she thinks, idly.

Oh.

Unfortunately, it hadn’t worked last night, but she thought she saw a way to see off the Queen’s white fool if she pulled _that_ move again.

The woodwind instruments make a strange, low sound that starts to build, with the players’ voices building with them, rising higher as one of them struggles to emerge from a pile of brown cloth.

The King lets out a hard puff of air.

“Would Your Majesty care to allow me to translate?”

Of course, there’s another thing that will stop her laughing.

Milady’s green eyes flash at the King, who chuckles and says: “Yes please!”

“What we witness here, sire,” she purrs, “is the Birth of Man.”

“And all those funny people…”

“Some of them are animals,” she gestures with a limp, open, cupped hand, “and others attending spirits.” Again the sagging gesture, as though her hand was too heavy for its wrists.

With that amount of jewellery, no wonder, though Constance knows the strength of them. She wonders if the King does.

“And that chap with the white beard up on the ladder?” Constance feels her eyes roll, closes them hurriedly for a moment.

“The Lord God Almighty, directing His Creation.” How does she manage to make that sound dirty? _How?!_

“And that’s Adam!” the King exclaims, clapping as the figure emerges and stands, triumphant. There is a flurry of clapping from the courtiers which peters out when Adam’s last shred of earth falls away.

“Oh,” says the King. “He’s not wearing awfully much, is he?”

He is mostly wearing paint over his broad, dark muscles, as far as Constance can tell, and up goes the finger to press beneath her nose.

“Well, Your Majesty,” says Milady, “nakedness is no sin… yet…”

“Ah, aha! Very good! What’s he doing now?”

“I believe he’s naming all the animals.”

As the animals are ‘named’ - a touch to the shoulder or flank or head - they rush to find their mate, and wander off, content, to sink to the ground together, some after elaborate dances, some after simply crawling slowly, brushing along each other’s sides.

The Queen has her own fan, a gift from some ambassador or other. It is white, with small flowers printed on it, framed in some kind of dark wood, and she uses it to cool herself at this point. Many of the Ladies who have been invited to this entertainment do so themselves with relief at this signal of propriety, although not all of them have anything much more than handkerchiefs to employ. Constance, who has no fan, makes do with the resultant breeze from sitting at the Queen’s left hand.

“And now,” says Milady, from beyond the King, “Adam sits in lonely solitude. He has not been blessed with a proper companion yet.”

The strings murmur and the tambor sets up something like a heartbeat. The “ground” heaves behind Adam and he stands, doubled. “Spirits” dart in to bind the two figures back-to-back with strips of cloth.

“Curious,” murmurs Milady.

“What’s this?” asks the King, as puzzled as anyone.

“They… this is a… different interpretation of the… text…”

Constance sighs. “This is Lilith,” she says, “Only she was supposed to be there from the beginning.”

“What’s this?” asks the King, peering around.

Constance looks up to see pairs of blue, brown, and green eyes all staring at her. Well. She might as well keep going.

“Some scholars have it,” she begins, “that humanity was born both male and female - back-to-back with the mate God had given them.” She points. The figures lumber awkwardly about before sinking to their knees, beseeching the man on the ladder. “But it was very awkward, so God separated them.” The attendant spirits rush in to free the pair.

“Oh!” says the King. “No Eve?”

“Not… yet, Your Majesty.”

“So how does… oh!”

Lilith, in a similar state of dress to Adam, has leaned over her mate, pinning him to the ground by the wrists as she straddles him. Her hair is a wide cloak of dark-red curls which flies and falls over the pair of them.

The music heaves with the pair, and after a few surges he manages to knock her away to tumble head over heels. She stalks away from the cloth-covered area into the bare floor beyond, raising her fist, and certain of the spirits follow her.

“Now… oh,” says Constance, “they’re skipping the next one and going straight to Eve,” as the Creator descends, bends, and pulls at Adam’s side, whereupon he plucks a performer by the hand from the mound of cloth behind the recumbent man and she rises to a quietly triumphant surge of strings, blonde, pale, slender, neatly coiffed.

“Look,” says Milady. “God is forbidding them the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge.”

“Of course,” says the King. “You’re very wise.” They chuckle at each other. Constance lays her hand on the Queen’s white knuckles, and she releases the arm of her chair to seize on Constance’s fingers.

As God remounts his ladder and looks down, the couple on the stage kiss, quite chastely, and lie on the ground, but the restless mutter of flute and shawm summons Eve up to walk and

“Oho!” says the King. “Who’s this?”

“Lilith,” says Constance, quietly, “come back to Paradise to mess things up.” The Queen squeezes her fingers at this, and they share a small flash of eyes and sideways smiles.

While attention was on the central characters, Lilith has been wrapped from the waist down in criss-crossing, thin strips of gold and green cloth binding her olive curves. Definitely satin this time, thinks Constance. Her legs are bound together, and the knotting extends beyond her feet.

“The Serpent,” drawls Milady, “ripe with temptation.”

The performer drags herself to the pole that Milady has identified as the Tree of Knowledge. It is held up by a stoic-looking, silver-haired man who Constance is surprised to realise has been there all along, like all the other green-speckled people holding up the bits of wood and fabric that make the glade of Paradise. What else has she missed?

The Serpent-Lilith reclines and beckons Eve, who steps, fresh and curious, in a lilt of strings towards her. She sits to engage with this strange new creature and

Oh.

“Oh!”

“My,” says Milady.

With a rustle of the tambor and an unsettling pairing of single string and shawm, the pair twine around each other and begin to kiss, slowly, passionately. There is a pause, and a rustling crescendo of fans and people shifting.

 _The thing is_ , says Constance to herself, _you knew this was coming, but you didn’t think they’d_

Well.

The Serpent presses Eve’s face to one full breast, lifts her spare hand to the Tree, who hands her a scarlet globe, which she proceeds to unravel and wrap around the neck, breasts and torso of Eve, leaving a long strand to drape between her legs. It dangles obscenely, trailing back behind her on the floor as she rises in a daze to walk back to Adam, and it tangles around his waist and legs when she embraces him.

God is about to discover them and Constance is thinking, furiously, the Queen’s hot hand still entwined with hers: _Ninon was right - the women_ always _get blamed._

God points to the red which has ensnared them and they hang their heads and begin to trudge towards the front of the stage, towards the dais, not out into the desert.

 _Well, that’s very clever_ , thinks Constance. _Very, very clever. And nearly done, thank God._

And she looks up to her right as the music soars and the company takes its bows to some confused but universal applause, led by the King, who is smiling broadly. She relinquishes the Queen’s hand to join them, but the Queen is looking solemn, sombre, and the only eye that meets hers is Milady de Winter’s, cat-green and gleaming, a slow and sideways smirk lifting one eyebrow before she turns away.

*  *  *

That night, Lilith and Eve twine again and again in front of Constance’s eyes, and she knows that he is somewhere nearby, warm and safe, and Lilith wrestles a paler Adam, whose eyes are now the colour of a winter sea, and now Ninon twines with Milady, whose free hand beckons and, as Constance thinks “well, sod it, I’m not stopping _now_ ,” Milady’s voice tells her that nothing could be more natural than for a married woman to take a lover, and the strings surge with Constance, heaving against her fingers, flying and falling.


	6. En Passant

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A passage in which bodies dart, and pass each other.

“I’m not saying you shouldn’t,” said Constance.

“Which is a very good thing, considering,” replied the Queen, with a bright, edged kind of amusement.

Constance sighed. “I’m just advising you think about this some more, is all.”

“I have. Are you saying no to me?”

“No. Well. I’m. Of _course_ I’ll come with you, but I can’t help remembering how badly it went last time. Also: how badly it went for the King…”

“All of which means that we can use those experiences to inform our tactics this time.”

“I just don’t understand why you’d want… actually, that’s a lie.”

They were strolling, in sober Sunday best, away from the Cathedral, pausing their conversation as they passed a pair of bishops, who nodded, hands folded, then set off into the square. This side of the colonnade shaded them from a fierce, white sun that ducked into it between the pillars, and everywhere, if you know where to look or listen for them, were guards.

In- or outdoors, the Queen is always accompanied. When she sleeps and when she plays chess with Constance are the most isolated she ever gets, second only to praying in her room, and even then guards patrol the corridors and servants sleep a few feet away.

The Queen, to allow herself cliché and hyperbole for a moment, lives a life of unimaginable luxury, and unimaginable confinement.

Who wouldn’t, she thought, want to find a way to marry comfort, protection, and freedom, the best of both worlds?

_What could be more natural than for a married woman to take a lover?_

Shut up.

_That’s not your line._

I think you should leave now.

_Better._

Satisfied?

_Not yet…_

“Constance?”

“I’m sorry, Your Majesty, I’m just considering tactics…” and strategy.

Back in her apartments the Queen paced, alone with Constance. “The last time,” she said, “we were walking, in not particularly effective disguises, into an enemy camp in broad daylight. I’m not sure,” she smiles a flickering smile, “exactly what I was thinking.”

 _I think_ I _do_ , thought Constance, flattening her lips and nodding vaguely.

“I’ve been thinking about this,” she went on. “And we don’t want to seem too wealthy, or we might be set upon and robbed.”

 _Which part of Paris are you thinking of visiting?!_ wondered Constance.

“And… I don’t think I could quite carry off the mien of a… common woman.”

Constance felt her mouth tuck sideways into a cynical, unimpressed expression and let it, thinking: _sod it, she needs to know_.

“I’m, er, sorry,” said the Queen.

“That’s… all right,” said Constance, slowly.

“So I was thinking: somewhere between respectable and common.”

“A craftswoman or her servant? That kind of thing?”

“Yes.”

“Respectable enough not to get harassed, but not so respectable that she wouldn’t be out at night?”

“Yes.”

“You’re aiming to strike an interesting balance there, Your Majesty.”

“Maybe… we ought to get you into the habit of, er, calling me by my name when we’re alone.”

Constance’s eyebrows went up.

“I’m asking a lot of you, I know.”

“It isn’t that, Y-Anne. Hm. I’m trying to think of your reputation if anyone overheard me. ‘Her Majesty is letting that commoner become awfully familiar. Who _does_ she think she is?’”

“You do Madame de Motteville remarkably well.”

“Thanks,” said Constance, drily.

“You let me deal with Madame de Motteville and her coterie. You focus on finding the right disguises for us.”

 _All very well for her to say_ , thought Constance, hurrying down the corridor towards the main stairs, _but it’s not as easy as it sounds. I could go home, right now, and fetch a pair of my old dresses, and then adapt one to the Queen’s figure. We’re of a height, she’s just a deal… narrower than me, despite having had a child._

Mind full of darting on the one hand, and why this was a useless exercise on the other, she only just looked up in enough time to avoid running into another woman who smiled wickedly as she swerved neatly.

“Mind your step, Madame Bonacieux.”

“My apologies,” she said automatically, and turned to find herself caught by a pair of glass-green eyes above, dear Lord, how did she stay in that?

Milady’s ringletted head tilted one way while her painted mouth slanted the other. “And what kind of errand could be whipping our dear Queen’s Confidante along at such a pace?”

Constance’s teeth ground only once, lightly, and she gave Milady a hard kind of smile, eyes narrowed slightly, remembering to not cross her arms, not point her toes in. “I’m sorry,” she said, as insincerely as she dared, “but the Queen’s business is her own.”

“And yours, these days.”

“Indeed. But not yours.”

“You have grown bold, little Constance.”

“Well, you see,” she said, smiling, smiling, “I’ve come to know my worth, which is measured by what lies between my ears, and how well I keep my mouth _closed_.”

“Oh. I see your time rubbing up against the granite ladies of the court has sharpened your tongue, if not your manners.”

“I choose to bestow my courtesy where I see fit.”

“And yet, Madame… Bonacieux, you persist in addressing me in the vulgar* fashion.”

“You have quite enough faces to make up the deficit, I should think.”

With a terrible delight, she saw colour leaping in Milady’s cheeks and staining that long throat, tucked the tip of her tongue between her teeth to prevent her face changing.

“What,” and she unclenched her teeth, “do you mean by that?” with a terrible kind of grin.

“What I mean,” said Constance, advancing, “is that if you’re an English noblewoman, I’m the Queen of Sweden.”

“I see,” said Milady. “I see.”

“If you have quite finished, madame, I have business to attend to.”

“Oh please,” she said, offering a nod that did nothing to veil the cold fire that glittered in her eyes.

Constance turned. Don’t run, don’t run, don’t run.

Well.

Well, you have just insulted the King’s Mistress, someone, incidentally, who probably wouldn’t stop at poisoning your porridge and offering you a bigger spoon with a smile.

Oh, but it had felt good.

Very, very good.

Damn.

I _really_ don’t have time.

Well, maybe five minutes…?

 

* * *

*Constance has used the singular you/ your here throughout, which is also the vulgar, or familiar - as opposed to plural, which is also the polite, or formal form of the word in French.


	7. Exchange

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Exchanges are made, and wine is drunk.

After supper, Constance sits, unpicking the threads of her old blue dress. In a slightly confused way, she is trying to make the Que- mm- _Anne_ look as pretty as she can.

Which is a mistake. This is all… There’s something we’re missing. 

She holds up the dress to catch more of the fading light, leans back into the window embrasure, such as it is. Really, all she needs to do is unpick one side and enclose the back panel tighter, but she wants to remake the dress properly.

For which she doesn’t have time. Just. Just do a good enough job. It’ll never be seen - who’ll care?

I will.

She wants the cloth that cups the Q-Anne to be… perfect. _To match the needlework of any of those fancy dresses_ , she thinks, crossly, then holds it up higher, squinting, _which will only happen if I can get this unpicked._

“What are you doing?”

Without looking up, she says: “Unpicking this dress so that I can resize it for you. It’s ‘decent’ without being flashy or too common.”

“No, I meant: why are you ruining your eyesight like that? Light a candle.”

Light a candle. Like I’m made of mon… oh. Right.

“Right,” she says. “Thank you. Sorry. Force of habit,” lays down her sewing on the window seat and goes in search of the necessary items.

“Your husband not a man not a man to waste resources…?” The Q-Anne has laid down her correspondence and is watching her.

“Hah. He’d squeeze a denier to milk it for a sou,” she says absently, then says: “To be fair, I was also raised… frugal.”

“What did you do before you married?”

“I was good with a needle,” she says. “Mending and such, when I was little, but I have a good eye,” she laughs slightly, “in a few ways of saying that, and people began to bring alteration and then full-blown making work.”

“So you were a good match for a draper.”

“That’s what everyone said…”

A silence falls. Constance busies herself with striker and taper, and has a couple of candles sizzling to fill the gap until they settle, sweet scent flaring into the room.

“I’m sorry,” says The-nn-Anne. “I don’t know much about your life before you came here. That’s… remiss of me.”

“To be fair,” she says, cheerfully, “I don’t know much about _your_ life before you came here!”

“Hmm. I loved to ride. Sometimes I would catch the the riding master on a good day and persuade him to take me out into the countryside. Every day I could I played chess. I learned Latin, Greek, Italian, and French. I hated it! Did all I could not to speak it! I was fourteen when they brought me here. Neither Spanish nor Austrian, and now not French either.” She gives a small, deprecating laugh. “They told us we had to consummate the marriage as soon as possible, just to be sure, and my relatives made the French agree that I would get my dowry back if Louis died before getting me with child.” She looks down, face working. “The King did not wish to… well, he was still little more than a child himself at the time.”

Constance stays very still, then wishes she still had the sewing in her hand. It might afford the… Anne some cover.

“I am glad I was finally able to give him an heir,” she says, at last. “I’m afraid… I mean to say: I am fond of him, but I do not find the company of men of particular interest to me.”

“Well,” says Constance, in a breezy rush, “maybe you just haven’t met the right man yet…” She claps her hands over her mouth, watching the words gambol away from her, the perfect echo of something her Aunt might have said.

Oh, hell.

Th-Anne’s mouth writhes into a very strange sort of smile. “Well,” she says, “perhaps not. How many men have you known, Constance?”

She feels herself start to blush. The hell with it. “Two,” she says, firmly. Then: “Well, one-and-a-half.”

Anne squeaks, her eyes creasing, and she stands up to circle her desk. “What _do_ you mean?”

Constance’s face squirms, and she finds herself twisting her cuff. Oh, stop it! “I took a lover,” she says, as pragmatically as possible, “but… we didn’t wish to risk pregnancy, so…”

“So…?” Anne steps closer, face alight.

“So, we, my Aunt, you see. Well. Anyway, there are plenty of things that people can do together that aren’t…” She looks Anne in the eye, straightens her face again, heaves a small, calming breath. “He used his hands and his mouth. As did I, for that matter.”

Anne’s eyes are wide and glittering. “You say your Aunt taught you this?”

“No! No… but she used to say that people got themselves into a lot of trouble by not knowing how everything worked and that there was more than one act of love, of…” her voice lowers, involuntarily, “ _bringing_ someone, but.” Louder again: “Well. I never got any practical details from her.”

“So you worked them out for yourself?”

“Um. Sort of. Also: he, er, knew some himself already.”

“Your lover?”

“Yes.”

“And your husband?”

Constance laughs until she chokes. “Oh! Oh, I’m sorry, but if you knew!” and starts choking again. Anne fetches her a glass of wine and waits, stroking her back gently until she’s able to straighten, sniff, wipe her eyes, and take the wine. She sips it, sniggers briefly, then sips again. “Thank you.”

“That’s quite all right.”

“You’ve met my husband,” she says, grinning still.

“Ah, briefly.”

“Hah. Well, he’s very…” she draws herself up, assumed an expression of pinch-faced distance.

“Formal?”

“Pompous. And that’s, well, that’s a decent indication. He is somewhat… proper. Cere-monial,” her voice cracks in the middle of the word, “even!” and she starts cackling again, gulps her drink.

“We need more wine.”

“I need to sew straight!”

“Never mind that for now!”

She comes back with a cup for herself, refills Constance’s, who finds herself saying: “What about the King?”

“What about him?”

“Is it… ceremonial or…?”

She sighs. “It’s. It hasn’t changed much since we were first together.”

“Oh.” She thinks about it some more. “ _Oh._ ”

“Yes. Although I’m sure he enjoys different sorts of… with his… with…”

“Milady.”

“Oh, that woman.” Her small face is screwed up, and her hands work on the stem of the cup.

“Your M-Anne. You mustn’t. She’s very… persuasive. She…”

“Yes, I know - apparently she knows _tricks_.”

“Tricks?” Constance has an immediate image of Milady juggling fruit, and has to clamp down on a snigger for the sake of Anne’s dignity.

“Bedroom tricks.”

“Oh.” Constance is trying not to think of what these might be and failing magnificently. “Well,” she says, swallowing, “the King has never strayed in all these years. I doubt he’ll… I doubt his focus will stay with her for very long.”

“He’s not exactly known for… extended focus, no.”

Constance nods, and thinks: _Poor thing. D’Artagnan could maintain focus for_ ages _._ Blushing again, she buries her face in her cup.

Anne, cup in hand, strolls to the window to look over the gown. She sets down the cup and holds up the garment. “It’s a pretty colour,” she says.

“Yes,” rushes Constance. “And you just need to wear an ordinary shift underneath, then a kerchief will complete…” then she frowns, mutters “I still don’t think…”

“It’s a good balance,” says the other, as though she hasn’t heard. “You know, what you were saying?” she turns, “respectable enough but not too respectable?”

Constance stays frowning.

“What is it?”

“Well, Y-Anne, what you may not understand is that you don’t need to look too rich or too poor to be assaulted - sometimes all you have to do is just to be a woman.”

“Oh.”

“I’m sorry. You… I realise that you might just not know that.”

“Ah.”

“It’s just… it’s not like when the lads went with the King - he had armed backup just because… that’s how it works.”

“I see.”

“And really, the sort of women who are in taverns - and I think you said you wanted to see the inside of a tavern as well - where was I? Oh yes: unaccompanied women in taverns are often, well, there for business.”

“Well,” says The Queen, “then there’s only one logical strategy to employ.” She places the dress on the window seat, takes the cup from Constance, and pulls her by the hand. “Sofia?”

She explains what she wants. Sofia’s eyes meet Constance’s briefly, and slide away.

 _She’s right_ , she thinks. _This is a terrible idea._


	8. Overextended

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A change of costume, a chase in the dark.

“Your M-hm. Sorry. Look.” She tries again. “I _really_ don’t think this is a good idea. And before you say anything, I want to remind you that you told me not less than three times this week alone that you value my opinion.”

“I thought,” says the other, turning to view another angle, “that I told you not to call me by my title when we were alone together.”

“With respect, it’s hard to know what to call you when you’re dressed like that.”

“Is it the hat?”

“It’s not the hat.”

“Well, then?”

Constance folds her hands neatly in front of her, closes her eyes, takes a few calming breaths. It had taken Sofia a surprisingly short amount of time to find the outfit and here they were, a day later, the sun westering again, having wound the Queen between them into this… this…

She opens her eyes. “Maybe the smaller hat,” she manages to say. “I think that one might be a bit much, actually.”

The… the other sweeps off the large hat (Lord, she thinks, I hadn’t seen the feather!) in an almost roguish gesture and tries on the soft cap. Sofia arranges the long hair appropriately.

“Much, er, less…”

“Garish?”

“Well,” she says. “That’s a word.” She cocks her head. “Turn around a bit?” She complies. “Try moving around.”

“It’s.”

“Yes?”

“It’s easier to walk in than I thought. I suppose that makes sense.”

“Yes but - forgive me - the walk’s all wrong.”

“Pardon?”

Constance huffs a short sigh. “You want to look more confident. More… brash. You know, take up more space. All right, the elbows work. Maybe a bit less? Right, put your weight back on your heels. Yes, like that. Now kind of drop that weight more with each step. No. Not stamping. Make your stride longer. Look.” She demonstrates, swaying in a compact, heavy movement. “Right, better. Now look around as if you own the place. Well, you do, but… show it!”

She looks around. “Sofia, do you have the belt?” Sofia brings it and they hang it just above the hips, cinch it, but not too tightly. “And now we hang… there. That’ll change things. Now try walking again.”

There’s now a strut to accommodate the accoutrements. A turn at the top of the room to survey them, hands on hips.

Constance and Sofia look at each other.

“Well, Your M-”

“Anne.”

“Well, no - not Anne, not like that.”

“No, I suppose not.”

They all think for a moment.

“Call me André,” says the brash young vision, hand on the pommel of a borrowed sword, bright hair hidden from sight.

Constance blinks rapidly. “All right,” she says. “You know,” she adds, after a moment. “The black really does suit you.”

“Thank you, Constance.”

“Your-A-André, I still have to ask: are you _sure_ about this?”

The other opens her… his mouth and nods curtly. Constance turns to share another glance with Sofia, takes another deep breath “Right,” she says. “Let’s do this.”

*  *  *

“Orite, darlin! I ain’t seen you in here before!”

“I’m from out of town,” replies Constance, politely, “not long arrived.”

“Where you from then?”

She broadens her accent. “Recloses.”

“Wherezat?”

“Near Fontainebleau.”

“Oh. Wassit like?”

“Rubbish. That’s why I’m here, looking for work.”

“All by yourself?” he leers.

Bloody hell. “No.” She points. “That’s my cousin.”

“Bit young, isn’t he? To be chaperoning ya, I mean.”

“Oh, he looks younger than he is.”

“Yeah?”

Try over thirty, for a start. “Yeah, he came out early, started really small. Never really grew but makes up for it now, though.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, best swordsman in our village.”

“Right.”

“Yeah. Maybe even the whole of Fontainebleau.”

“Yeah?”

“He’s thinking about joining a regiment.” Stop it now, Constance, before your mouth runs away with you. “It’s difficult to do without a letter of recommendation, so he’s going to try his hand in one of the less popular ones first.”

“Did he say which one?”

“Oh, monsieur! Do I look like someone who can remember the names of Paris regiments?!” Okay, stop before you hate yourself.

“Only I’ve got a mate in the 9th, you see.”

“Oh right?”

And off he goes. Bla, bla, important mate, bla, bla, could put in a word, bla, does he want money or attention or kisses?

 _It’s funny_ , she thinks, _I don’t remember men being this boring before. I think I’ve been spoiled_ , she nods and smiles, _by men who can carry a conversation about… things they’ve actually done, dreams that actually… excite me. The occasional bloody question about my own thoughts…?_

Maybe the world is full of Bonacieuxes and “Do remind me of your name,” and Legrands, “Pierre, then,” and all the while there are women who are teaching themselves how to read and write, and how to use pennyroyal, and how to wield a sword, and how to shoot a pistol, and how to balance the books, and how to play chess, and how to read maps, and how to speak Greek, and how to plant trees, and we could be making forests and libraries and music and, and apothecaries and not having to listen to

“You know what I mean?”

“Surely.” She smiles up at him. There’s a crash and howl of ceramics. “Do excuse me,” she says. “I think I need to see how my cousin’s getting on.”

*  *  *

“Well,” says Constance, “I don’t think they’ll find us here. Meantime we’ll wait until you get your breath back.”

André is doubled over, hands on his knees. He twists his head and smiles unsteadily up at Constance. “I didn’t realise how out of condition I was.”

“Well, you’ve not been…”

“I’ve done nothing more strenuous than take a turn around the gardens in a good long while.”

That and your chest is quite tightly bound.

He straightens away from her, leaning his gloved hands against the wall of the deep doorway and shakes his head. “I didn’t think he’d take it that hard.”

“Well,” says Constance, carefully, “men can be a bit touchy about these things.”

“Sorry about that.”

“That’s all right,” says Constance with a smirk, “little cousin.”

“Such a cheek.” He looks over his shoulder with a grin, then moves over to her. “I’m older than you, remember.”

“But no taller.”

“No, look,” stepping in closer, putting his hand on top of her head and moving it over to his.

“You dipped!”

“I didn’t!”

Constance takes him by the shoulders and squares him off in front of her. “Try again.”

Smiling straight into her eyes, André puts his right hand on top of her head, starts to draw it forward, then his expression changes and he shifts some stray hairs off her forehead, tucks them behind her ear. Constance feels her breathing become more shallow. His curved finger strokes down the side of her face. “Such a cheek,” he murmurs and

Leans

Oh God.

Soft lips touch her own and she’s leaning forward in turn. One gloved hand moves to the back of her neck, the left to her shoulder and her arms go around the slender waist in front of her as the kiss deepens.

Constance gasps as a gentle tongue moves along her lips and she opens her mouth wider, returns the exploration.

He tastes so sweet. The scent of cheap beer and recent flight hangs about him but his mouth. God.

Oh.

Oh, God.

She breaks off, stares. “A-An-Anne.”

“Constance.”

“Er.”

“We. We should go.”

“Yes, er, yes.”

He - she - nnn! - André takes her by the hand and tows her up the street towards the Palace.

*  *  *

Later, the events of the night play over in her head, and she sees again the glitter in her eyes as she leant straight-armed against the mantle, still in her man’s weeds, a cup of wine in her left hand as she stared down into the fire while Constance busied herself changing the bed linen, both of them silent. She had fled when Sofia approached her mistress to start making her ready for bed.

She lies on her back, eyes wide open, for a long time, perfectly still. Sleep takes a while to claim her.


	9. Forfeit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here we see tactics and strategy intertwine with reward and punishment

Two days have passed. Two days of… normality: correspondence, meetings, messages, attending formal court sessions, making the Queen’s bed, walking with her, listening to her talk about her son, her plans for one of the flowerbeds, playing chess with her, hearing her not talk of Milady, hearing her not talk of her Governess’s private life, hearing her not talk about how much she still misses Spain, hearing her not talk about the distance between her and the King, hearing her not talk about that space within the spaces that she is not talking about.

Constance’s ears are ringing with silence in the midst of chatter, and that evening she locks herself in the linen cupboard just to sit, curled on the floor in the corner, and hear nothing but the sheets, blankets, and pillowcases settling, settling, settling.

And Madeleine says, and Angelique says, and Madame de Beauvilliers says, and the Vicomtess de Rivière says, and Madame de Motteville says, and The Virginals twitter, and the Rooks croak, and the gardener’s boy whispers, and the butcher’s boy grunts, and the guards mutter, and the King chortles, and the candle maid suggests, and Marguerite sighs, and the pastry cook murmurs, and Milady insinuates, and Rochefort sneers, and Sofia gestures, and the draper’s wife, what does _she_ say? The Musketeer’s former lover, what does _she_ say? The Queen’s Confidante, what does _she_ say?

 _What do_ you _say?_

“Dammit,” she says, wiping her eyes on a crumpled pillowcase and stuffing it under the nearest pile to flatten itself out, sniffing hard before she leaves the room.

In the Queen’s quarters, the chessboard has already been laid out, and she eyes it sidelong in passing, feeling a bone-deep weariness at the thought of being chased to all edges of the board again by someone who has been studying the game for decades to her months.

Bed made, discarded linen handed to Sofia, she returns to the sitting room. The… she sighs… _Anne_ is sitting at her usual place, her back to the small fire, laid more for light than heat, black pieces arrayed in front of her. Constance now knows enough to know that she is white because she’s a beginner. Fine.

Th-Anne smiles up at her, eyes crinkling, as warm and welcoming as ever, and Constance thinks: _she has been practising that expression her entire life. She has been perfecting “pleased to see you” longer than I’ve been threading needles. Dear God - what a life…_

“Do please sit, Constance. I’ve been meaning to ask: how have you been getting on with your reading?”

“Well, thank you, m’Anne.”

“Tell me - what do you think of Padre López’s work?”

Constance looks at her hands, feeling the, rrh, feeling Anne watching her.

“I think, maybe,” she says, slowly, “that he was writing for people who had a different grounding in the game from I have, and possibly also other disciplines such as more advanced mathematics, algebra, and other arts studied for the pleasure of them.”

“Ah. Yes. I’m sorry - I should have thought.”

“No, it’s all right.”

“What, um,” she sounds a little awkward, “what grounding do you have in mathematics?”

Constance feels her mouth creep around to the side again, opens it before it can get too far. “I was taught basic sums and the means to balance a business’s books. This was so I could help do as much for my husband’s business.”

“So recently.”

“I was taught to read around the same time.”

“Oh.”

“Madame, sorry, Anne, my French is good, but this man also scatters words and phrases in Latin and Greek throughout as though they were universal languages.”

She finally looks up as her passion rises. Anne is staring at her, her perfect brows creased. “I’m so sorry,” she says, finally. “I never thought.”

“Neither did I! But.”

“But?”

“I don’t want you to think that I’m not enjoying playing!” To her surprise, she finds this entirely true. “I really do, and… and it’s helping me understand things!”

Anne’s smile is small and secretive. “Good.”

“That was part of your plan, wasn’t it?”

“I confess: yes.”

“Hmm.”

“I have another question for you, Constance.”

“What is that?”

“Why haven’t you beaten me yet?”

“What? Sorry - pardon?”

“You haven’t won yet. And I’ve been going easy on you.”

“G-.” She breathes, astonished. “Going _easy?!_ ”

“Yes.”

“Bloody hell. Oh!” she claps her hands to her mouth. “Sorry!”

The Queen waves it off. “I’ve been thinking about this. I wonder if you need another kind of motivation than the purely academic.”

Constance’s mind reels for a moment until she twigs. “Oh, like a wager, you mean.”

“Yes. Stakes.”

“Ooh.” Constance’s mind races. What can she bet on with the Queen of France? Money is dismissed in a moment - this needs to be in court currency. Information or protection. She toys with half a dozen, including protection if she accidentally stabs Madame de Beauvilliers with a fork, or trips and punches Milady. None of these quite work, though, because what is she staking in return? Then she thinks: trust. That’s the other currency.

“You have something in mind.”

“Yes. For every piece captured we either have to tell a secret, or remove an item…” she is going to say _of jewellery_ , but realises that the odds are rather stacked against her there.

“Oh,” says the Queen before she can finish. “For each piece eaten, an item or a secret. I accept.”

Ten minutes in, and neither has lost any pieces. Constance feels in a fury of concentration. Then the black Queen Knight snaps forward and takes her lead pawn.

Damn.

She looks up. “What secret should I tell?”

Anne bites her lip briefly. “The name of your lover.”

“My former lover.”

“Your former lover.”

She pauses, weighs the image of him in her mind, says: “D’Artagnan.”

“Of the King’s Musketeers.”

“The very same.”

“Oh, Constance. You have _excellent_ taste.” She leans forward. “Tell me, d-”

“Ah, no - one secret per piece.”

“Damn.” Constance is shocked - this is the… yes, the first time she’s heard the Queen swear. Her eyebrows go up. “Oh, hush,” says the other with a wave of her hand. “Play on.”

Seven minutes later, Constance bags the black Queen Knight with her black fool. She is surprised, but pleased that she spotted it.

“Well,” says Anne, smiling. “What shall I lose?”

Many of the things Constance can think to ask immediately are rather dangerous to know, so she lands on “Why is Madame de Beauvilliers in your court?”

Anne actually rolls her eyes, then her head, then her hands. “Because the Cardinal planted her here to spy on me.”

“Really?”

Her head rocks forward again. “Really.”

“Hah.” A pause. “Your play.”

And now some tactics and refinements of the rules start to emerge. If a secret asked is not known, the loser can offer another secret. If that secret is not desired for whatever reason, then off comes an item. Similarly, if a secret is not to be shared, off comes an item. And finally, a loser can pre-empt the asking by removing an item straight away if she thinks that her opponent is going to follow up to a previous secret with a continuation into sticky territory.

The fire cracks and squeaks merrily to itself. Anne’s feet are bare, and Constance has one arm bare, no shoes, and a stratagem that she can’t believe Anne has missed. Breath held, she sacrifices a Tower.

“Ooh,” chuckles Anne to Constance’s hisses. “Hmm.” Her smile twinkles, and she bites her lip. “How did d’Artagnan best bring you? Assuming he did, of course.”

“Of course,” returns Constance, keeping her eyes resolutely on Anne’s and not on her next move. She finds them sliding as her mind leans to recall. It doesn’t take long, but her face is very warm when her gaze returns and she says: “With his mouth - his lips and tongue.” She has no idea why she has elaborated, only that she wants to keep her opponent’s attention.

Anne smiles, takes some bread, and smears it with some of the honey Sofia brought to the table twenty minutes before retiring. She takes a slow bite, chews it, then nods, eyebrows raised. “Your turn.”

Constance smiles back, reaches forward, and slips her pawn to the far edge. Anne looks down and gives a low cry. “Oh, Constance.”

She grins. “Now, we haven’t discussed whether promotion also carries a forfeit.”

Anne’s face is bright with several emotions, all of them quite fierce. She puts her head on one side and sucks a sticky finger. “I think it must, you know.”

“Hmm.”

“And which one do you want?” she points at the board.

“The Queen, of course.”

“Of course,” she murmurs. “We don’t have any spares unless you go and fetch your new set, so we’ll need to remember who she is.” She looks up. “A Queen in disguise.”

“Yes.”

“And my forfeit…”

Constance feels a kind of reckless surge. “How many men have _you_ known?”

“Oh,” she says. “I think it needs to be an item.”

_Which is confession enough, isn’t it?!_

Shh.

She stands. “You’ll need to help me, Constance.”

 _Dear God, she means to remove her gown_. While she has seen the Queen in her shift enough times, there is something about the scenario of sitting with her at leisure in her undergarments. She rises and steps to the woman’s side, starts loosening the relevant stays. Her hands seem overlarge and clumsy, and Anne’s skin very warm where she brushes it at the nape of her neck, shoulders, arms.

She walks away hurriedly with the garment and lays it reverently on a small chair near the fire. She returns, slipping a little on the smooth floor between rugs in her stockinged feet, and sits opposite Anne, who is rolling a cup of wine between her palms and staring at the board.

Constance takes a sip of water, and loses, in swift succession, her other sleeve and her own gown. She does not know the name of Porthos’s father, the Queen cares nothing for Monsieur Bonacieux’s sister’s recipe for paté, and while Constance has some morsels to offer about Milady, they both appear to be avoiding that topic by common consent.

Constance settles back in her chair, pulling folds of her shift around her legs and trying not to let her mind wander.

_You are probably the first woman the Queen has ever undressed._

Shut. Up.

_Your hand’s shaking._

Get. Lost.

She shifts a pawn for something to do, hunches forward, straightens up, hunches again.

Anne has loosened her hair to lie in a cloak about her shoulders. Jewelled pins glitter among captured pieces. She reaches for her Queen, pinches the dark wood as though about to lift it, then murmurs “J’adoube,” and releases the crown, keeping her fingertip on the tip. Constance can’t help but notice that her finger isn’t entirely still - it pulses atop the piece as though in rhythm with her thoughts.

Her throat feels thick all of a sudden and she tries to clear it, quietly.

“Are you all right, Constance?” Anne asks, sweetly.

“Yes, thank you.” She takes a sip of water. Then, since her opponent appears to still be deep in thought, she reaches for some bread and honey herself.

Anne looks up at her quiet cursing, and, quicker than she could have imagined, grasps Constance’s left wrist and brings her mouth down to lick the spilled honey from her palm.

Constance freezes. She hears the sigh and chuckle of the fire, feels the texture of the rug underneath her stockinged feet, the way her heart is throbbing in her throat, hears the sound of

Oh

Oh Lord

Anne’s breathing

Oh

Feels the tickle of it across her fingertips

The rasp and slickness

No

Of her tongue humming along the long, curving line that skirts the soft pad of flesh beneath the thumb.

Constance watches her, bent over her hand, and feels her shift to place the two sticky fingers within her mouth.

She is immediately on her feet and dragging her hand and Anne’s mouth to her own. She dimly hears the clatter of chess pieces falling beneath their twining moans.


	10. En Prise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So sweet, so sweet the taste.

Anne’s mouth tastes of honey and salt. Constance’s right thumb traces a looping path over her smooth cheek while she struggles to remember not to put her sticky hand in the other woman’s hair.

Anne moans again and Constance feels small hands clasp either side of her waist through the thin fabric of the shift. Then the other woman pulls back from her and seizes her left hand again. “I wasn’t finished,” she says on something like a growl and, as her other fingers fist in the fabric of Constance’s shift, her pointed tongue scrapes the length of Constance’s first two fingers from palm to tip, and then her lips close around the ends and Constance feels her knees buckle a little.

She slowly pushes Constance’s fingers between her lips, tongue rippling over and between them the entire time. Constance groans and her other hand closes involuntarily in Anne’s hair.

_Don’t just bloody stand there!_

She swoops in to the other’s neck and starts kissing her, working her way down from just under the ear towards her shoulder. She becomes bolder as she descends, feels the vibrations of Anne’s moans through her lips and, faintly, around her increasingly sensitive fingers.

Suddenly her fingers are free and Anne is gasping. “Oh, kiss me,” she says. Constance moves blindly up towards her mouth and then they both freeze and pull back, hands still on each other.

“Oh,” says Anne. “I didn’t mean. I…”

Constance’s eyes narrow and her jaw sets. “If it wasn’t an order, _Your Majesty_ , I suggest you ask nicely.”

Anne’s eyes go wide and her brows go up in the middle. She stands, panting, staring at Constance.

“Oh, Constance,” she says. “Please. Please kiss me.”

A wild feeling rushes through her. “Why?”

“Because I… I’ve dreamt of kissing you for so long, and the reality is… even better. Oh, God, please don’t make me beg for your sweetness.”

Constance almost feels as though she’s about to cry, and instead cups both hands either side of Anne’s jaw and brings their mouths together slowly, soft as a feather fall, then, as Anne sways, hooks her right arm about her waist, pulling their bodies together. Their kiss rapidly deepens, their tongues exploring each other with increasing confidence. Constance’s arm tightens involuntarily and Anne moans.

She can feel the woman’s warmth, the patterns of it across the body clasped to her. They both shift simultaneously to tessellate, thigh between thighs, and Constance feels the other’s heat and

Oh Lord

She feels what can only be moisture against her leg as the other starts to rock against her. To her intense surprise, she finds that her own hips are tilting rhythmically to press that soft pad of aching flesh against Anne’s leg over and over.

Her head tilts back with a yelping kind of cry which modulates into a groan. “Dear Christ,” she says aloud, her eyes shooting open as she stared first at the ceiling then into the other’s eyes in a kind of shock.

“I’m…”

The other fixes her with a wild look as she says “I swear, if you apologise for… for anything, Constance, I’ll… I’ll”

“The worst punishment you could lay on me right now would be to stop.”

Anne chuckles. “Oh Lord,” she groans, “never that!” and pulls Constance down for another soul-drowning kiss.

Her face is so smooth, her lips meltingly soft, with a core of irresistible strength, and Constance finds that she cannot, absolutely cannot stop wanting to touch and taste that mouth, pull moans from it with her tongue.

All the while they are rocking together, and now their hands are everywhere - in each other’s hair, crossing shoulders and backs. And

Oh, and

She can’t help herself. Her hands run down the other’s sides to grasp the firm roundness of

_Don’t look now, but you’ve got hold of the Queen’s arse._

“God help me,” she groans aloud, and buries her face in Anne’s neck, right hand cupped and kneading beneath one buttock, left roving up her back.

Anne suddenly shivers and throws her head back. Constance experimentally runs her fingers lightly up her spine again, feels her quiver as she hits some kind of sensitive spot just between her shoulder blades. 

“Do you like that?” she murmurs.

Anne makes a high-pitched sound like _nnh, nnnh!_ which she decides to take for a yes. She keeps running the fingers of both hands lightly up and down the woman’s back, feeling her start to rock more urgently against her. The heat and pressure against her thigh redouble and suddenly Anne is stiffening, crying out, burying her face in Constance’s chest. She holds her close in a kind of wonder as she jerks spasmodically to a halt in her arms.

“Oh God,” comes a muffled voice after a while. “God have mercy.”

Constance smiles. She guides Anne’s sagging weight into the nearest chair, which happens to be the one she recently relinquished, and soothes her hair back with vague sounds until Anne looks up from the cradle she’s made of her own hands.

Constance sees with astonishment that the woman is crying. Or has just finished crying.

“Anne?” She bends down in consternation, thoroughly relieved to see her smile through her tears.

Anne shakes her head, eyes still dazed. “I’ve never…” she says, voice and smile flickering.

“ _Really?!_ ” exclaims Constance before she can stop herself.

“Well,” said the other. “Not quite like _that!_ ”

Constance starts to chuckle, and Anne joins her, a little weakly. As the laughter fades out, Anne looks up at her, and Constance sees her face change, dropping to a very particular kind of… hunger.

Oh my.

“Constance?”

“Yes?”

“Will you let me taste you?”

“Taste… me…?”

“Your body. I. I want.”

Constance feels a little helpless, just raises her eyebrows.

“I. I want to run my mouth over you. All of you.”

“Oh God.”

“May”

“Yes!” says Constance, overlapping hastily. They stand together hurriedly, the chess chair scraping and threatening to topple. Anne catches it in one hand without looking, and Constance feels a jolt of desire speed through her. Some of this must show on her, as Anne’s expression shifts again, eyes dropping to her mouth, and her hands reach out to take Constance’s face and bring it to her.

Her kisses are fast, hot, and urgent. She catches Constance’s lower lip with her teeth and, on hearing Constance moan, does it again, slower, more deliberately. Constance hears her own breathing speeding up, rattling in her throat. Her fingers close convulsively on the fabric at Anne’s waist. Anne responds by wrapping her arms around Constance and moving to kiss her neck with that same intensity, bringing lips, tongue, teeth to work on her.

Then Constance feels her fingers on her right breast, shifting the thin fabric across it. A thumb finds her nipple and the fingers close around it, rolling. Anne’s mouth moves from her neck to join her fingers, and Constance puts a hand to her own head, reeling in sensation. Currents of feeling are coursing from her breast to her groin, and she groans aloud. Then she imagines what this will feel like on her bare flesh, and groans again.

She feels Anne smile against her. The next thing she knows, her mouth releases her and delicate fingers scrabble to undo the stays that hold her shift together. She starts to help them, and Anne chuckles until Constance captures her mouth. They sway together, fingers busy, mouths locked, until Anne is able to slip a hand inside Constance’s shift and so much blood rushes from her head that she feels swoonish for a moment.

_The Queen has got her hand on your left breast and is squeezing it._

I know. Oh, _God._

When Anne gently pushes the fabric aside and lowers her mouth to it, Constance hurriedly broadens her stance, convinced she’s about to fall. The other has one hand on her back, as if to steady her, and the other gathering Constance’s flesh into her mouth as she works her tongue and teeth over the tautening flesh.

Constance has never felt anything quite like it. She finds herself scooping the other’s hair into her hands and gently cupping the back of her head. Anne’s tongue swirls and Constance’s eyes roll up. The tugging sensation is pulling waves of heat from her, pleasure rising and falling across her whole body.

Her soft moan deepens to a groan as Anne’s left hand curves around and drops straight to her mound, where she lets her fingers ripple across the sensitive flesh. Constance feels herself start to rock again.

“Dear God,” she moans. “Oh, dear God.”

And Anne drops to her knees.

“Wh-” says Constance as Anne starts to gather the material of her undergown, bunching it ever higher until it clears her thighs and, “Jesus,” she starts to lay kisses there, on her trembling legs, pushing her face against the soft flesh, working her way up with infinite slowness.

She looks up. “Why, Constance…”

“It… It was a hot day…”

Anne sighs happily; her hands take Constance’s, one by one, and hook the folds of fabric into them, pushing them higher up Constance’s body. She then kneels up and

Bloody hell

Her tongue

Oh

Oh, Lord

Her tongue arcs delicately to land

Ah

Right there, yes, yes, _please_.

And she’s being slow, methodical, gently parting the flesh of Constance’s thighs to make more room for her mouth, driving the tongue forward to divide her folds as her hands cup Constance’s rear, kneading and

Oh.

Oh

“P-” She tries again. “Please, I h-have to… s-”

Anne’s face reappears. “Oh! I’m so sorry, of course I’ll stop!”

“No!” exclaims Constance. “Sorry, no, I meant I need to sit down, or, or  something. I can’t stand for much longer if you keep doing that!”

Anne’s face sharpens into a mischievous moue and she leads Constance to one of the soft chairs near the fire. Constance wobbles into it and feels Anne push her back slowly so that she’s semi-reclined. She watches the other woman lift and drape the fabric over Constance’s thighs, which she gently parts before bringing her chin forward and

Dear Christ. Constance starts to rock, as best she can, against the driving pressure of the hungry mouth against her, tongue diving ever deeper into her

_Fucking hell, woman, just say it_

her cunny. Ah. Now. Now she’s, she’s parting me with her thumbs so, oh, so as to get deeper, God, running her tongue up, first broad swipes, narrowing to circles around, fuck, around my nub. Oh. Oh, God.

_The Queen is lapping at you_

Yes

_Her face buried in you_

Christ, yes.

_Moaning her own pleasure as she drinks you_

“Christ, yes!” she all-but howls, gripping the arms of the chair and arching as Anne brings her, throbbing, to fire and a kind of shockwave that runs throughout her body.

She collapses into the chair, dazed, panting.

Anne laps at her another couple of times, making a sound of deep satisfaction, then raises her head. Constance cracks open her eyes, sees her, tries twice to rise, then surges upwards.

“You… shouldn’t…”

“Don’t you tell me,” she says, and pulls Anne’s face towards her to kiss her.

The taste of herself on the other’s lips is intoxicating. She revels in it, even while her head is heavy, emptying itself for sleep, swirling her tongue across that soft flesh, trying to gather every drop into herself.

“MmmhCons?”

“Mmh.”

“Cffmm-Constance?”

“Mmmhyes?”

“I think we need to get you lying down.”

“Mmmh.”

“Hah! Come on!”

She wobbles to her feet, smiles woozily at Anne, staggers a little in her arms, then follows her as Anne draws her to the bedroom.

“Um.”

“Come on…”

“But”

“Just lie down for a moment.”

“Oh, all right.”

Kind light flickers around her, and a weightless dark, cradled in soft arms.


	11. Recapture

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A continuation in the dark

And she thinks that she must have dozed; when she next opens her eyes the window is completely dark and the candles very low. She hears breathing next to her and turns.

“Anne?”

“Yes?”

“Oh, good.”

A low chuckle. “Who did you think it was?”

“Heh.” She considers her words for a moment. “Quite honestly, I thought it might have been a dream.”

“A dream?”

“Well. A particularly vivid one.”

“Do you often dream of me taking you in my mouth?”

Silence.

“Constance?”

“Define: ‘often’.”

A wicked chuckle and a shift of fabric. A gleaming eye comes into view, with heavy folds of bright hair to catch the light.

Constance rolls, wraps her right arm around her, and fumbles to her mouth to kiss. She feels more than hears the other gasp, closes her eyes and presses into her, now hearing her moan lightly, feeling her hands clutch at Constance’s back.

She breaks off and sits up. Looking down she can just about make out Anne’s raised eyebrows.

She grins. “You said you wanted to taste my whole body.” The other makes a tiny, involuntary chuff of sound. “We only have a few hours until dawn, and we are both wearing entirely too much clothing.”

Anne shoots up, an incredulous kind of half-smile on her face, seizes her own undergown and starts to pull it up over her head. Constance helps with tickling fingers and, as the fabric starts to clear, a darting tongue, drawing hisses and whimpers, and

And her mouth is locked around the straining nipple of Anne of Austria. The tip of her tongue strums it as her lips tighten, tugging a teeth-clenched grunt from the woman. She rolls her face along that perfect flesh to take the other, letting her fingers stay playing with the first, and now she smells Anne’s arousal, and the scent dives to her own core.

Constance can feel Anne’s abdomen tighten as her hips begin to twitch forward. She starts to kiss down her soft, soft belly, an almost fearful excitement growing in her chest. Anne clears her throat. And then clears it again, more meaningfully.

She looks up. “Yes?”

“You still appear to be clothed, Madame.”

Constance’s smile spreads sideways out of her volition. She rises, tries to bob formally at her companion while sitting sideways, fails in a crack of laughter, which echoes back at her.

Her breath catches, her face falling into a kind of dazed delight. She loves to hear her laugh unguardedly, realises only now how painfully rare it is. Anne’s face sharpens as she reaches out to tug Constance’s shift from her.

Constance emerges great-eyed, trembling. Anne responds with a quick grin, then darts forward to capture her breasts with hands and tongue.

God.

“Mmmh, mmmh…”

“If you’re trying to say ‘Majesty’, it will go very wrong for you.”

“Oh, is that so?”

She pounces, pins the woman’s wrists either side of her head, and now it’s Anne’s turn to gaze, face dropping. She swings her leg over the hips beneath her and Anne’s eyebrows go up in the middle, a number of emotions mingling in her face. She relents, sliding a thigh between hers, feeling again the miracle of wet heat, this time directly, releases Anne’s wrists and feels hands twine in a flash through her hair, pull out the last of its restraints and tug her down.

Anne bucks hard against her thigh, moaning into her mouth, hands roaming over every part of her torso she can reach. She revels in these sensations for a long set of rocking, panting minutes, before remembering her original mission.

She pulls back from the kiss, and starts to work her tongue down Anne’s body, writhing slowly towards the foot of the bed, lifting her eyes to Anne’s face occasionally, drinking in her expressions as she lights on her breast, then lays a trail of moisture down her gyrating torso. Her sides and lower belly bear a light pattern of shallow ridges - stretchmarks from pregnancy, she assumes. Constance runs her tongue over them, enjoying the texture, watching Anne’s expression of incredulous desire flash across her, replaced by something older as her head grinds back into the pillow, mouth slackening and eyes shuttering.

Constance’s left breast has just slipped past the junction of Anne’s parted thighs, erect nipple catching at her nub. Anne bucks, moaning. Constance lifts the weight of her own breast in her hand, presses it more firmly, watches Anne rock against it, a series of keening moans spilling from her. The sensation is extraordinary but now Constance can no longer resist and dives to taste her.

Ah. Ah, more salty than her own and even more, dear God, enticing. She licks and presses without much thought at first except satisfying her own hunger for the woman’s flesh. Head clearing a little, she slides further down, and lifts Anne’s thighs, thumbs circling spasmodically as she tries to return the other’s earlier attentions with added interest. Her own breath is coming hard, heart pounding at her chest. She pays court with her tongue to the entire length of Anne’s cleft, noting what makes her tremble, what makes her strain, what makes her moan. Her nub is now very swollen, and Anne cries out as Constance closes her lips around it and sucks gently.

“Oh God, oh God, oh _God_ ,” she moans. Her hips buck hard, and Constance, determined to keep up with her, braces one hand lightly on her belly, pressing down with her tongue each time she rocks into her mouth.

Tremors start to course through Anne’s body and her stomach tightens under Constance’s palm. Suddenly her mouth floods with tart-sweet savour as Anne cries out - a long, ululating sound of release before collapsing.

Constance laps for a little longer, revelling in the taste and smell of her climax, then crawls up her side and reaches to hold her. Anne rolls swiftly and flails a boneless arm over her back, nuzzling into her hair, muttering unintelligible sounds.

Constance, smiling, kisses her forehead, and Anne reaches up muzzily to kiss her, humming and smiling against her mouth, scooping a slow tongue across hers.

“Mmmhtes, tes.”

“You like the taste?”

“Mmmmmhmm!”

“Me too,” she kisses her again, “me too.”

After a few minutes, Anne turns over rapidly onto her other side with a small grunt and wraps Constance’s arm around her belly, patting it a couple of times before relaxing again. Constance patiently frees her own trapped tresses and the pinch of flesh this twist had produced, kisses the back of Anne’s head, and lays her own on the pillow.

Just a few minutes. Just…

Just a f…

Jus…


	12. Promotion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Consultations, and conclusions, of a kind...

The morning summons are about to ring out, but that’s all right, because she’s on time. Early, even. She turns a critical look at the full-length mirror and frowns lightly. Silly bloody collar.

She takes it off and settles a flat, lacey trim with a slight golden sheen about her neck.

Better.

Stroking it happily, she steps away and starts to head down the corridor, the movement of others in a similar direction hinting at the time, their common purpose. Mind on the morning ahead, she tells herself. Focus.

She nods at various people she knows on the way past. Her heels clip briskly along until a hand slants out, snake-fast, to catch her forearm and pull her into a shadowed alcove. She shakes herself free and pulls back a step, jaw clenched, refusing to rub her arm. She looks up, but not far, into the opaque, simmering eyes, and cocks her head to one side.

“Yes, my Lord?” she says, with a small smile.

“My dear Madame Bonacieux,” he says. “You have some time…”

“Not much.”

“Let us take a stroll while we talk of things pertaining to our mutual interests.”

“I have no interest in taking a stroll with you, my Lord.”

The muscles in his jaw bunch briefly. “Then let us conduct our business here.”

“If we must.”

He smiles humourlessly, closed-mouthed. “You are very close to the Queen, are you not?”

Her heart thumps once, sickeningly. She straightens her head. “This is my role, my Lord, my _job_.”

He sneers briefly at the word. “I am concerned for the Queen’s welfare.”

“Your care for the Queen is well-known and much remarked.”

He starts at this, veneer cracking for the merest of instances. “Indeed,” he says, slowly, “I have ever been her friend since childhood.”

“Indeed, my Lord.”

He rallies. “So allow me to share my concern with you.”

“Of course.”

“I have noticed that Queen seems…” he turns his head away for the moment, surveys the corridor, “that she has been _distracted_ of late. And yet only yesterday was heard to sing.”

“Sing, my Lord?”

“Yes.”

“Sing what, my Lord?”

He flaps his hand. “Some little tune. It was quite… _pleasant_.” And again he surveys the area, eyes distant.

“She does have a pleasant voice, my Lord.” And, oh, how it sings.

“Yes,” he says. Then: “Yes. She has seemed… she was smiling…”

Constance narrows her eyes. “My Lord?”

“Well?”

“Well, my Lord?”

“Well?”

She suppresses a sigh. “My mistress is happy and sings well for the joy of it. Where is my Lord’s concern?”

His mouth quirks unpleasantly. “I am concerned,” he says, lowering his voice, “that someone may have been bringing her joy…” she looks blankly at him. “The King ignores her for his… for _other concerns_. If she is happy, I want to know if…”

Constance raises her eyebrows.

“This is delicate, you understand.”

“My Lord.”

“But I have the Queen’s best interests at heart.”

“Of course.”

“If it were to be known…”

“What, my Lord?”

He huffs through his nose, clearly impatient with her obliqueness, leans forward. She braces herself to not lean back. “Madame Bonacieux, does the Queen have a lover?”

Her eyebrows raise of their own accord, and she then injects as much repugnance as she can into her expression. It’s not hard; there’s a wellspring waiting. “My Lord!”

He persists, gripping her arm again: “This is very important! I must know if any man has been in her rooms. A man who is there at strange hours, or who has no proper reason for being there. I… I must know it.”

Steely-faced, she plucks his hand off her and drops it. “My Lord,” she says stiffly, “the only men who have been in my mistress’s apartments recently are the King, the doctor - there for the care of her son, as you may recall - and you yourself. Along with the men you commanded to drag me there on wicked charges. Of these, the only one I have seen with any frequency there is you.”

His face clenches.

“I would be happy,” she goes on, “to arrange for a chaperone so that you may search her rooms for a hidden man. I fear it would be a waste of your time, and a risk to the reputation of the Queen, if anyone were to ask why…”

His mouth starts to work. She thinks he looks like he’s trying to fish a seed out from between his front teeth, and clamps down on the snigger waiting to erupt.

“Well, my Lord?”

He prises his jaw apart long enough to hiss: “No, thank you, Madame.”

She bobs at him slowly, gazing at him calmly the whole while. “I thank you for your care of the Queen, my Lord.” She cocks her head slightly. “If that is all…?”

He flaps a hand, face still a knot.

She clips along at a faster pace, still on time, surely, when another hand spins her and she comes face-to-face with

“Seriously?!” she sighs, and peels the hand off her upper arm. She narrows her eyes briefly and smiles. “How refreshing to see you up so early…”

Milady’s full mouth creases to a flat line. “ _Dear_ Madame… Bonacieux…” she starts.

Constance sighs, and waits, arms folded.

Milady shakes off that tack and smiles, head cocked, asks lightly: “What did the Comte de Rochefort want with you?”

“Oh,” says Constance, carelessly, “information.”

“Really?” One exquisite eyebrow rises.

“Yes,” says Constance, “he seemed to think that I would have extra information about one of the ladies of the court. I got the distinct impression that he does not know as much as he could about her and is under the impression that I would know more.”

Milady’s nostrils flare. “Really?”

Constance’s eyebrows rise. “Really.” She waits.

Milady’s head tosses and her eyes slide. “Nice try.” Her eyes return. “The Comte knows as much about me as…”

“As others do, Anne…?”

Milady freezes, and Constance feels the cold pour over her in turn. “You have me mistaken for the Queen,” she says, eventually.

“No,” she returns, “I think that’s _your_ error.”

Milady smiles very broadly then, but her eyes are still snapping with ice. “ _Dear_ Constance,” she begins.

“I am amazed,” says Constance, louder, raising her eyes to the ceiling, “that you keep seeking out conversation with me.” She locks gazes with the woman. “I can’t help but wonder whether your time with… other company is somehow… unsatisfactory… that you come to me,” she steps closer, “for stimulation…”

Again, she has the pleasure of watching the colour rise in the other’s face and neck, but this time sees her swallow convulsively, the band at her neck rising and falling. Constance smiles a little broader, eyes as calm as she can keep them.

“Oh,” says Milady, venomously slowly, “I _do_ enjoy our little duels.”

“Maybe one of these days,” says Constance, “I’ll give you satisfaction.” She steps back, nods. “If you will excuse me, I have important business to take care of,” and leaves the woman standing, hands grasping rhythmically at her sides.

As she slips into the gilded room, she sees that she is not, after all, too late. The King and Queen enter just as she has made her way to the front, near the dais, and she folds low with the rest, rising to match glances with the Queen who smiles, warm and slightly lopsided, before raising her gaze to the rest of the room.

 _You all have a piece of her_ she thinks, as the business of the day begins, _taking her in many different directions, but when the doors close and the sun sinks she is mine alone, and I hers._ And she smiles. It is another lovely day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, thank you all for accompanying this massive shift in character, setting, and pace. The next work in the series, _Mirror, Mirror_ , is on the way as we speak.


End file.
